Allied health professionals in Queensland Health returning to work after maternity leave: hours of work and duration of time on part-time hours.

ConclusionThe study showed that most AHPs who took maternity leave returned to work part-time and remained part-time for an extended period. The data suggest that managers could permanently backfill a proportion of hours released due to FWA after maternity leave without major budgetary risk due to the need to accommodate existing employees' entitlements. However, this would require a significant policy change.What is known about this topic?Current research on this topic has concentrated on the benefits of paid maternity leave, timing of return to work and use of FWA by employees on return to work after maternity leave.What does this paper add?This paper presents the first comprehensive data on patterns of return to work and part-time hours following maternity leave for AHP employees. Access to a unique payroll dataset provided the opportunity to describe this for a cohort of AHP employees over a period of 8 years following a maternity event. A survey of AHP managers' experience with maternity leave and return to work arrangements supported the findings, underlining the associated difficulties with staff management.What are the implications for practitioners?The hours released through resignations or reduced hours over this period of study suggest that management could backfill a proportion of released hours permanently, or at least offer temporary staff longer-term contracts, once an employee returns from maternity leave on reduced hours. PMID: 30696546 [PubMed - as s...
Source: Australian Health Review - Category: Hospital Management Authors: Tags: Aust Health Rev Source Type: research